Originally from Timaru, David moved to Christchurch to attend UC, where right from the start he took on a lot by studying towards two degrees focused on Computer Sciences and Accounting.

During that time, David supported his study by undertaking several summer and part-time jobs, most notably working at Telogis as a Software Engineer, and helping a new start-up firm with everything from filing for patents to coordinating manufacturing in China, incorporating skills from both degrees.

He was also treasurer for Golden Key at UC (UCGK) for three years, an experience that he found quite inspiring.

‘It’s a great organisation which promotes community service, academic performance and strong leadership,’ he says. ‘I was lucky enough to go to two conferences, in Queensland and Atlanta, Georgia. One of my most memorable experiences is of handing out food parcels in Clarkson, Georgia – one of the largest refugee towns in the United States. I will never forget the look on the faces of those kids.’

During his final undergraduate year at UC David was the CFO of entré, an organisation encouraging students to think entrepreneurially.

These opportunities have certainly been helpful, and led to David winning the UC Software Engineer of the Year in 2011 as part of his final-year Computer Science project.

‘This was an amazing experience, and I have made lifelong friends. The lecturers who run the course are a one of a kind, and I thank them for their time and effort.’

After completing his undergraduate degrees, David continued his study with UC in the Master of Engineering in Management (MEM) programme after hearing great things about it. ‘Undertaking the MEM programme was probably one of the best decisions I have ever made. I made a great bunch of friends, and learned new skills, such as project management and systems engineering, which are not as readily taught elsewhere within the University. The skills I learned in team management will stick with me for the rest of my life.’

One of the highlights of the MEM for David was the project he undertook with the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA). This involved investigating the responses of infrastructure utilities to the earthquakes by bringing together learnings that had been documented in nearly 100 separate reports. He also conducted research into providing emergency drinking water to small communities in the immediate aftermath of a disaster, which was used to create a booklet as part of the Disaster Mitigation Guideline series for future disasters.

While still studying for his MEM, David was hired by ANZ on its CFO Graduate Programme. The programme involved four rotations over two years, including work in Market Finance, and resulted in David becoming a Chartered Accountant.

After completing the programme in 2014, David was given a role in Market & Treasury Risk where he evaluated how ANZ would handle a potential future liquidity crisis, an experience which gave him ‘a very good foundation in how a bank is structured and what precautions are taken to ensure it has a diversified funding base’. This opportunity lead onto another working with the ANZ Treasury team in Australia validating a new Liquidity metric (LCR) for new requirements to all Australian Banks and New Zealand subsidiaries from the beginning of 2015.

At the end of the project, David was asked to be the Subject Matter Expert for a new New Zealand treasury system, creating a complex system that evaluates and forecasts changes to liquidity and interest rate risks to ANZ through customer data each day. His involvement with the project has landed him a role as the Interest Rate Risk Manager for the banking book.

David is looking forward to more of these opportunities in the future. ‘I feel quite inspired to be working for ANZ. The business is very diverse, and therefore so are the potential opportunities. I really enjoy my work, and each day presents its own set of challenges. Working in both a Business and Project environment has certainly been interesting!’